Bright Eyed
by euphiiie
Summary: There's a difference between shadows and darkness. :M&L:
1. one

A/N: Going to be a very short multi chap.

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Bright Eyed

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The thing that you could find the most alluring about him was his eyes, huge irises splashed in perfect circles of brilliant blue - a neat pin-prick of black pupil in the middle carefully outlined by a fringe of violet. And although Mario might have nice eyes too, he always though Luigi's were nicer then his. It probably might be odd to be jealous of something so insignificant as that, but it was true. It's on Wednesday, sometime in November - or at least he thinks it was, his memory isn't very good - when it happened, the day he found Luigi sitting in the corner of his room. Covering his eyes, crying out in agony while huddled up in the corner of the room.

He remembers that part, he tried so hard to make the bleeding stop.

It is completely fascinating to experience the way memory works. Shapes, sounds, smells, colors, noises, whispers, screams, sign, faces. They can all bring him back to a certain moment. A certain memory that aches deep within his soul where he's been trying to hide it for so long. He's tricked himself into thinking that he threw that memory into the trash compactor. Ground up and never to be seen, heard, or experienced ever again. And then he sees the sign. He smells the smell. He hears that song. And he's are instantly transported into the past. So much so that he swears to God in heaven that he's reliving it all over again. Only this time everything, all his senses are heightened.

Mario doesn't like remembering these sort of things, but it doesn't bother Luigi. He looks forward, not back and Mario only wishes he were that way. And it's funny, because although that horrible thing happened to Luigi, it only seems to be haunting him. He sometimes lays awake at night and wonders why and sometimes when he thinks about it - how it felt for Luigi - his chest physically tightens, it hurts. It hurts so much, because he made a promise and he couldn't keep it. Mario can feel his eyes sting, sometimes burn. _You're not supposed to cry, remember? No, you don't do tears. _Mario takes a minute to wipe his eyes, being careful not to sniffle. Luigi sits idly on the couch, staring blankly at the television.

"Mario?" Luigi asks, voice sounding a little sad, but that's probably because he can sense Mario's sudden discomfort. "What's wrong?"

"N-Nothing," Mario replies softly, picking up the cup of coffee and walking over to plop down on the couch with him. "Here." He hands it to him and Luigi takes the cup, careful for it not to splosh out of the rim and stain the couch.

"Thank you," Luigi says, taking a sip and then placing it on the table near him - well, tried to - the white mug crashes onto the floor and shatters, Luigi flinches. Mario watches Luigi go off the couch and fall on his knees, feeling around and some of the coffee ends of seeping through the fabric of his jeans. "Oh, crap! I'm sorry, I'm so clumsy..." Mario plants himself at Luigi's side, wiping up the brown liquid with a cloth.

"I-It's okay! It's not your fault," He stammers, the cloth soaking up the coffee almost immediately as he spreads it across the floorboards. "I should know by now to always help you with this sort of stuff." Mario mumbles the last part under his breath. He looks up at Luigi for a minute, he sits on the floor with his legs folded underneath him and his hands on his knees, staring at nothing - confused look on his face. He feels for Mario's arm and latches onto him, snuggling into his shoulder.

"Your so nice, I can't thank you enough for putting up with me."

He's smiling now.

"Putting up with you? It's not like that, I actually like taking care of you." Mario insists, looking at Luigi.

Luigi squeezes his arm tighter and Mario doesn't understand the broken feeling inside his churning stomach.

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It starts with her.

She was never well, or at least that's what Mario thinks, there was one point in their life where they were so sure she was normal. She used to be sweet and caring, she used to be a good mother. But then he left, the guy that was never really their father left her and then it just seemed to pry at the giant, cavernous crack that was running through her and then one day she just...broke.

Broke.

She shattered into pieces that fell all around him that he couldn't seem to stop stepping on. _But it wasn't your fault, you didn't know she was hurting, she should have said something. You could have made things better, or at least have tired. _

She didn't have to hurt him, he didn't anything wrong.

Mario assumes that she might have done it out of a drunken rage, ones that she has so often around the house, but when he found her she seemed sober. Sober and oddly enough happy, happy that she had done something like that, the shard of glass gripped tightly in her hand - so tight, that it end up leaving a deep cut in her pale skin. Blood all over her ruffled white dress and her sweater hanging off her shoulder blades, she looked a lot like a candy cane gone horribly wrong. The only reason she could come up with was that Luigi's eyes reminded her too much of _his_ - to her this logic seemed reasonable, she _had_ to get rid of Luigi's eyes - because they were haunting her.

The bleeding seemed like it wouldn't stop.

Splattered on the white walls, on the white carpet, staining it with it's pretty hue of red. His fingers decide to tremble. He let them fumble their way around the keypad and they still somehow manage to find the right numbers, cooper red rust staining them as well. But it doesn't matter anymore, that was years ago. She was a crisis and no one was looking to save her, and that may have been what had started this. But it doesn't matter now, or at least Mario hopes so.

She's dead now, neither of them attended the funeral, and neither of them are sorry.


	2. two

**not by morning**

by miss euphie

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(--chapter _two_)

--

_**I**_

Luigi opens his eyes, bright blue opening ever so slowly—his vision not showing him the interior of his bedroom: the yellow plaid duvet comforter witch was wrapped tightly against his waist and legs, the pasty white colored walls, or the large bookcase next to his bed that only had three books entirely—his eyes showed nothing but complete darkness. Which, even for being blind for almost his whole life, still scared him. He felt around, his fingers clutching the bed sheet on top of him, pulling his legs so that they could dangle to the side of his bed.

( _Don't fall-Don't fall-Don't fall. _)

He stumbles, the bedsheets tangled around his foot and sent him face planting onto the creme-colored carpet below.

"Ow. Ow. Ow." He mumbled weakly, his teeth and tongue getting a full taste of the dust-bunnies he didn't know was resting on the floor. He felt around again, a desire to get to the kitchen by himself making him stagger to his knees, he walked what he thought was towards the door; arms outstretched. He almost collides with the bookcase, but he eventually, after what felt like hours (which was just a couple of minutes), he finally gripped what felt like the doorknob. _Well, it could be the doorknob that leads to your closet. You know, the closet that you thought had the boogieman in it when you were five and it turned out to be Mom's gravy stained christmas sweater? _

He turns, he steps back and pulls it open.

He feels again, he groups the air outside for a moment, just to be sure. Yup, the kitchen should be to the right of him, or at least he hoped so. He almost stumbles again, on Mario's stray work shoes, but eventually he makes it towards the kitchen. He knows that he should ask Mario for help, but he wants to have at least a little independence, he feels for a cabinet. And as luck should have it, he takes out a cereal bowl, now for the cereal itself. This might be more challenging for you then you thought, because until now, Mario had been getting all your things done for you. Your laundry, your dirty dishes, what used to be your turn taking out the trash—stuff that now have become HIS job.

( _Burden, you were always a burden._ )

His eyes water just a little.

( _You have such a great older brother _)

"Luigi?"

The young brunette yelps, almost dropping the precious piece of china that once belonged to. . .Well, maybe not all that precious after all. . .bowl on the floor. Almost shattering it into pieces, pieces that Mario would have had to sweep up.

( _Burden-Burden-Burden _)

"Hey, good morning," Mario says, tone sweet and sleepy, Luigi can feel his footsteps walk over to him. Can feel Mario's hand on his shoulder, warm, so very warm. "You want something? I can get it for you."

Feeling defeated, Luigi decided that maybe he should just let Mario do everything, even if it meant being a _burden_. "Cereal?"

Luigi hears the clinking of dishes, something being poured into a glass, that _pop pop pop_ of the rice crispies. He then hears them being laid out in front of him, more clinking sounds, then a chair scrapping the hardwood floor. Mario is sitting down. Luigi feels around for his spoon, which he's sure is somewhere near the bowl, but he doesn't _feel_ it. It's not there, he feels around more but nothing and when he opens his mouth to ask where it would be, Mario shoves a spoonful of the cereal into his mouth. Luigi's eyes widen a little, his cheeks flush, he didn't want to be spoon fed like a baby.

He swallowed, realishing in the sweet taste.

"Mario, I can do it--" Luigi insists, but is still cut off by the silver spoon, he stares at him expectently—still only seeing nothing but black—he can tell Mario is smiling.

"No, I'll do it," Mario says and he can see that Luigi's eyes are narrowing to show protest. "I insist."

How are you supposed to become 'independent' if everyone around you decides you have to be taken care of?

**--**

_**II**_

It's a little later in the afternoon, he knows this because Mario told him so, he also told him that a guest would be coming over. Luigi cringes, he hates guests, mostly because he couldn't see who they were, if he still had his vision he wouldn't mind as much. Luigi sits idly on the carpet, his legs up to his chest and his hands were down to his ankles, he stares at the television blankly while a lit cigarette dangles from his mouth.

To the right of him, he can feel his older brother glaring at him.

"What have I told you about doing that in here?" He asks, tone a lot similar to mother when she got upset. "I don't want it to smell like an ashtray, besides we live here,_ together_."

Luigi blinks, puzzled.

"You didn't care before."

"That was before you went blind, you already lost your eyesight, I don't want you losing a lung too."

Luigi can hear Mario walk in front of him and he can feel Mario's hand waiting for him to hand the cancer stick over, grumbling, Luigi does. He can hear Mario put it out on the ash try that he's had for what seems like forever. The one thats at his feet and that used to belong to mom but is now Luigi's. It's weird, neither of them want to discuss/think about mom and yet it seems there's a little piece of her floating around all over the place.

Luigi hears someone knock on the door, lightly at first, then a little harder a few minutes later. Luigi doesn't get up, doesn't want to, wants whoever is at the door to go away. Footsteps are heard, Mario's, walking towards the door at an eased pace.

"Be nice okay, Luigi?" Mario asks pleadingly.

The door opens, some of the cold from outside sweeping in quickly, Luigi shivers. He hears Mario's footsteps again, accompanied by clacking heels, pumps probably. He hears Mario whisper something and then soft, nervous breathing.

"Hello, sweetie." A female voice mumurs, crouching down to meet his eye level, from her voice you can tell she's probably really pretty. Luigi pulls back, scrunches his noise as if her mere prescence disgusted him, she frowns in response.

"Luigi." Mario hisses, a warning in his tone, Luigi ignores it; there's an unfamiliar air around this girl and Luigi hates unfamiliarity.

"My names not sweetie--" Luigi says, venom seeping through his throat.

"Luigi!" Mario snaps in an angry whisper, the girl is hurt, Luigi senses it. "It's okay, Rosie--He's not really used to people.."

Mario leads 'Rosie' to the kitchen, mentioning coffee and brownies and Luigi blames her for ruining what could have been a nice, quiet evening. Luigi takes another cigar out of his pocket, grabs his lighter (which is almost out of liquid, make a note to buy another) and lights up. He takes in the smoke and exhales.

Inhale, exhale, repeat.

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Trying new formating, so far, I like this very much. Reviews are always nice. Sorry if this chapter is vague, I'm trying to move slowly. ^^


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